Welcome to my weekly blog post where I give thoughts on dramas I’m watching but not recapping.
This week I posted through episode 11 of the Thai soap opera with an LGBTQ+ character and loveline To Sir, With Love and episode 6 of the Japanese BL My Love Mix-Up!.
This week I’ve been busy/mostly rewatching stuff that I might post about later so this will be a fairly short post.
I watched
Our Dining Table Spin Off – 僕らの食卓 ~ 僕らの休日 – 2023 (Pictured)
A special episode of Our Dining Table
The Japanese title more literally translates to “Our Dining Table – Our Holiday” which is what the episode is about. Our sweet family takes a holiday and Minoru and Yutaka have a bit of a miscommunication.
I’m not big on extra content. Often it’s underwhelming and Japanese drama ‘special’ episodes are usually clip shows, which strikes me as very un-special.
Luckily this episode isn’t that, it’s more just another little moment in the life of this found family. The conflict revolves around a misunderstanding, but it’s kept at the low level of angst of the rest of the show. It’s cute and a little silly, but it’s also another 20-ish minutes spent with these endearing characters. If you enjoyed the show you should watch the special.
There’s one more episode but I’m officially dropping a show. There will be mild SPOILERS for some of the later episodes:
Naked Dining – 全ラ飯 – 2023
A currently airing Japanese food BL, I watched 8 and skimmed another 2 of 12 episodes.
A man who de-stresses by eating naked is caught in the act by an attractive young man who knew his grandmother.
The wasted potential of this show is painful. Up until episode 7 I was pretty much loving it. Then episode 8 came along and took the whole show into a misunderstanding-riddled labyrinth that it cannot escape. Worse, all this happened right after a secondary character made an impassioned speech for communication and understanding that the two main characters have since completely ignored.
A hug is misunderstood. Characters date even knowing one is interested in another person. Everything could be cleared up in one honest conversation but instead, we get dishonesty. I don’t like either character anymore. There’s someone for everyone and there are dramas for everyone so somewhere someone is enjoying this, but it’s not me.
Amidst the similarly disappointed comments online is the suggestion that this show should have been 8 episodes. That’s one solution.
For me, I’m looking at the title and fun, absurd, off-beat premise and wondering why they didn’t do something more with the ‘naked’ part. Not in a spicy way, but something about shame and self-acceptance and learning about each other and getting closer instead of driving each other apart. That would have been fun.